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It may be hard to believe, but Phil Kessel is the offensive force driving the Pittsburgh Penguins into the Eastern Conference finals against Tampa —- not Sidney Crosby or Evgeni Malkin.

Kessel, after his two goals Tuesday night helped Pittsburgh eliminate Alex Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals, is the Penguins’ leading scorer, and their leader on the power play, through two rounds of the playoffs.

All of that has Kessel earning rave reviews for his post-season performance and his value to the Penguins. It’s a contrast to his final months with the Maple Leafs, where he was a polarizing figure and made fans grit their teeth over his levels of commitment.

“We know how good a player he is,” Malkin told reporters after Tuesday’s win, the fourth game in the six-game series where the Russian star did not register a point. Crosby no goals in any of the six games.

“He can beat goalies — his shot, he has an unbelievable shot — and we try to help him, just support him.”

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What makes Kessel’s playoff scoring feats even more intriguing is the fact he is essentially a third-liner in Pittsburgh.

With Crosby and Malkin idling, the line of Carl Hagelin, Nick Bonino and Kessel has added scary scoring depth for the Penguins. In 11 games, Hagelin has eight points, Bonino has 10, and Kessel has a team-leading 12, including five goals. The trio accounted for all four Pittsburgh goals in the series-clinching win over the Capitals.

When he left Toronto, Kessel exited with his single-season low in goals, with 25, the first time in five full regular seasons with the Leafs that he failed to reach 30 goals.

That was 2014-15, the most miserable Leafs season in recent memory, and one that prompted a turnover in coaching, the front office and, not surprisingly, the roster. Part of that turnover included Kessel’s trade to Pittsburgh, where Toronto willingly absorbed $1.2 million in each of the next seven seasons of the winger’s $8-million-per-year contract, just so Pittsburgh could fit Kessel under a salary cap already stretched to the limits by Crosby, Malkin, defenceman Kris Letang, and goalie Marc-Andre Fleury.

But while it’s all glory for Kessel now, he certainly took a long and crooked road to it.

The Penguins tried him on a line with Crosby, then on one with Malkin. Neither worked. Crosby had but five points in October, and was a scoring bust by his standards until Dec. 12, when he outscored everyone in the NHL to the end of the regular season.

Kessel was even snubbed by Team USA, which did not name him to the original 16 players named for next September’s World Cup of Hockey in Toronto — a surprise since he is the leading American-born scorer in the NHL since 2007, with 256 goals.

With Toronto in the rearview mirror, Kessel fizzled for much of the season in Pittsburgh, but he had 24 points in his final 30 games as the Penguins became the NHL’s hottest team and forced their way into the playoffs.

For Kessel, there may be a sense of finally fitting in somewhere after exiting Toronto, hockey’s biggest market, where huge expectations were placed on his shoulders, but where a core group that included Dion Phaneuf, Joffrey Lupul, Tyler Bozak and James van Riemsdyk made the playoffs only once during Kessel’s Leafs tenure, and that was in the lockout shortened 201-13 season.

Kessel was often interpreted as unmotivated and a bad influence on young players, but he has settled onto a line in Pittsburgh with Hagelin and Bonino, two other players acquired by the Penguins for the 2015-16 season, who are also looking for career redemption.

His reputation in Toronto was pitted, but he was also, undeniably, among the top pure goal scorers to wear a Leafs uniform over the past quarter century. The rest of his reputation — mired in arguments about motivation and effort — might be repaired with every step the Penguins take towards a Stanley Cup final.

“He’s a little quiet, he’s a quiet guy,” Malkin said. “But he’s an important guy to us, and we’re glad to play with him on our team.”

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